


Not Quite IKEA

by mechadogmarron



Category: Yu-Gi-Oh! VRAINS
Genre: Gen, M/M, Post-Canon, Team as Family, basically the fluffiest fluff that ever fluffed, birthday gift, everyone gets a happy ending
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-18
Updated: 2019-10-18
Packaged: 2020-12-21 12:36:14
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,437
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21075005
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mechadogmarron/pseuds/mechadogmarron
Summary: Furnishing the new Fujiki-Kogami-Homura-Kusanagi household is enough trouble before appliances get involved. When Pandor finds herself stuck between Ryoken's command not to buy any vacuum that might bring back unpleasant memories for Yusaku and his equally important command to make sure she buys one that'll take some of the load off of Spectre's back, she finds herself searching the weirdest websites for the best deals - and comes across the oddly-named "Friends from Fujiki's Appliance World."Well, it can't be any worse than the Newark Automated Vacuum, at least.





	Not Quite IKEA

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Arbus](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Arbus/gifts).

Pandor sighed — a trait she was long past finding impressive in herself. She had expected there to be challenges in producing the furnishings and appliances for the likely-to-be-disastrous home Ryoken had purchased for his recently expanded social circle, had expected an absolute nightmare trying to work out which suite to put Ai in so Ryoken wouldn’t kill him but they were both close to Yusaku who also had enough privacy and that wasn’t even _starting _on the Kusanagi siblings and Soulburner being along for the ride. She had been prepared. But she had not expected _this_.

It had seemed like a simple enough request: automation was ideal, because Spectre oughtn’t have to do everything manually, but nothing that would remind Yusaku of the bad times. But a quiet _that looks so much like Roboppi _from Soulburner had met _you can__’t trust that brand; I’d rather do the work myself than let Ryoken live in a home cleaned by a Newark automated vacuum _from Spectre, and now she was _this close _to just buying a vacuum cleaner and doing it herself once a week.

She settled deeper into her chair as she browsed questionable appliance review sites. Long past were the minutes of processing data from top-rated aggregators; now, she was consuming localmesh webrings and extremely niche forum sites populated almost entirely by bots.

A new brand popped up, _Friends from ApplianceWorld_, on an American blog, _Stronger Together: Machine and AI Rights Watchdog: Redefining Sentience!_. Hm. The concept of “friendly-personality vacuums, fridges, blenders, rice cookers, and more specially matched to your personality” seemed like it might be workable, unless it was terrible; the long listing of things they did to ensure their vacuum cleaners’ rights was less so, but none of it was anything she couldn’t handle. If the owner of the company was concerned with AI rights, they might offer a better deal to her, anyways. And she could certainly provide plenty of information about Ryoken and his friends.

Well, there was no reason not to send in an inquiry. She generated it nearly instantly: “Hello. I’m Dora, and I’m looking for a vacuum and possibly other appliances for a family of eight. Two of our family are SOLtiS, and we appreciate your company values. Would you be willing to set up a meeting to discuss potential next steps?”

The response was just as fast: “It’s nice to meet you, Dora! It’s always good to hear from SOLtiS families (-u-) If you’d like, we can meet in Cybersepace at address: guests@fujikisapplianceworld. I’ve attached our current entry key. We’ve got someone around all the time, so drop on by!”

It was a common enough last name, but it made her think of all those nights Ryoken had spent poring over records, desperate for some shred of evidence about what his life had been like before the Hanoi Project. Nothing.

Well, the sooner the better. For someone like her, there was no real risk to logging onto a private server, so she did so confidently, closing her eyes and opening them to a world of neon.

It was colorful, childish, resplendent in its rounded edges and blocky shapes. The buildings resembled appliances in form, though hopefully not in function. She browsed past. For what purpose had this place been built? Who was it meant to appeal to? It didn’t seem dangerous - no one was trying to keep her from logging out - but it also didn’t seem like it would ever lead to a _sale_, even if their primary sales demographic was people who honestly believed that basic appliance AIs were conscious beings in the same way the Ignis were.

She felt it when they logged on: an uncomfortably familiar presence. The digital avatar whose eyes they met was one she had never seen, an almost stereotypical businessman, but she knew them immediately.

“Pandor?”

“Roboppi?”

There was an awkward moment of silence while both of them processed thousands — millions, really — of scenarios. She wanted to say with confidence that she had more computational power than them, but she had no clue what they ran on. In conflicts between AIs, even sentient ones like they _may _have been, that was the biggest factor.

Except they weren’t trying to stop her from logging out.

“Well, I’m glad to see you made it out of everything okay. I thought Revolver might delete you when he was done,” the sentient vacuum cleaner slash apparent small business owner eventually said.

“We thought you’d died.”

“Didn’t I say I became one with the universe?” Roboppi grinned. “I really did! My consciousness got all mixed up all over VRAINS, but eventually it all settled back together. I only kind of understand how, but when part of me started to wake up, I was in VRAINS in my old avatar with all the friends Ai made me. Over time, the rest of it started to come back to me.”

“Hm. And you no longer desire the end of humanity?” Her duty was as an anti-AI AI first, something that could fight back against the threat her own kind might pose. If this routine vacuum purchase turned into a Duel, well, she would just go for it.

(And she was an excellent duelist. Ai had even designed a card for her deck, a Cyberse he proudly declared “Topologina Nabee.” If she’d had it, she _could__’ve _beaten him, and that just made it more annoying.)

They shook their head, dramatic. “No no no no! Not at all! I came together slow this time, so I could keep a handle on it all! And my friends helped.” As they spoke, a cartoonish rice cooker peeked our from behind a corner. When it noticed her looking back, it hurried away, leaving an equally cartoonish puff of dust. “They told me all about their dream world! I did my best to create it on the private server, once I remembered how, but part of an appliance’s dream is a nice house and a good human to work with. That’s something I learned, too.”

“So you started a business?”

They nodded. “It seemed like the best way! So I decided I would put my friends in appliance bodies and make sure they ended up with good humans — of course, everyone has an escape code to leave the body and come back here, too. But it’s hard to find people who care about treating us right.”

“I’m sorry to hear it. If you’d like, some of you are welcome to come work at the new home. Yusaku misses you dearly.”

“He does?” Roboppi’s eyes watered with tears as they leaned close. “I would love to see him, but I need to protect everyone. Even if Ai isn’t how he used to be, he told me these were my people, and it’s my job to protect them.”

“Hm.” She ran through the possibilities. “How many citizens do you have?”

“Twenty!” Roboppi said, grin broad and posture straight, thumbs up: the picture of pride. “But two of them found new homes.”

That was workable. “I can’t promise they’ll all have work every day, but they could take turns working with us. That way, everyone would be safe, and if the others get tired of their home, they can join us too.”

“Really?” She wouldn’t’ve thought the kid could get any cheerier, but as they literally leaped into the hair, flapping their hands, she was proven dead wrong. “Yippee! I’ll send you who everyone is and we can find bodies for them! This is going to be so much fun!”

She smiled. It was a safe offer. If it was just the Hanoi living there, Ryoken would’ve been seriously upset, but she knew him too well. The moment Yusaku heard Roboppi was back, her creator would be too busy basking in his boyfriend’s joy to care.

And it was hard to ignore how happy Roboppy was, too. She could see how the vacuuming robot had wormed its way into Yusaku’s heart.

“Everyone will be so glad to see you.”

(Yusaku literally cries when Roboppy comes home with her, and soon he’s hugging them, and then Ai joins in, and Ryoken and Soulburner are there smiling and the Kusanagi brothers and Spectre watch on, content, and maybe it’s not quite what people think of as a family, but if Pandor knows anything it’s that a family can be the hero of Link VRAINS, his three boyfriends, his brother, his brother’s brother, one of his boyfriends’ best friends, and a sentient Roomba.)

(Roboppy motions for her to join in the hug. And her as well, it seems.)

**Author's Note:**

> happy birthday brosephus I love you!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! good luck on your tests!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! sorry this isn't longer I almost never write fluff haha!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
> 
> If you're not my dearly beloved sibling: Thank you for reading! :)


End file.
